‘She just left them, right?’ he asked. ‘She didn’t do anything with them, didn’t try to . . . ?’
‘She didn’t try to ram them down Lucia’s throat,’ Martinez said, ‘or squeeze their sap into her IV, nothing like that. But she left a card with them, wrote on it that Lucia might find a use for them.’
Both men had heard from Grace what Lucia had said to her during that afternoon, the words that had jolted her into checking the back of that photograph. ‘You might find a use for it.’
‘So I figured it was more of a gesture,’ Martinez went on, ‘than anything real harmful. Cathy throwing the bitch’s gift right back at her, maybe.’
‘Sounds about right,’ Sam said. ‘I guess.’
‘To Domingo, too,’ Martinez said. ‘Which was why he brought the flowers and the card to me instead of reporting it.’
Silently, Sam blessed Officer Domingo.
‘What did you do with them, Al?’ he asked.
‘What would I want with lousy weeds?’ Martinez said. ‘I wrapped them up and threw them out with my garbage. The card too.’
‘Thanks, Al,’ Sam said. ‘I owe you. Again.’
‘You’d do it for me,’ Martinez said.
‘Think I should speak to Domingo?’
‘I wouldn’t,’ Martinez said. ‘I just figured you should know.’
‘Thanks, man,’ Sam told him. ‘I’m . . . we’re very grateful.’
‘Nada,’ Martinez said. ‘No big deal.’
‘How much of a problem,’ he asked Grace a little while later, ‘do you think we have?’
‘I think we have all kinds of problems.’ She sighed. ‘If you’re asking me if I think Cathy’s gift to Lucia signals a career in poisoning, then no, I don’t think so.’
‘Think we should talk to her about it?’
‘Only in the lightest way,’ Grace said. ‘So she knows we know.’
‘“Heard you left Lucia a little something” – that kind of thing?’
Grace nodded, smiled, looked down at Joshua asleep in his crib beside their bed.
‘Sounds about right to me,’ she said.
Sam got closer to her. ‘What do you think, Gracie? We going to be any good at all at being real parents? All the way from diapers up, I mean?’
‘I know what you mean.’ She kissed him. ‘And I have no idea if we’re going to be any good.’ She paused. ‘I certainly hope so.’
‘Am I just doing the doting dad thing – ’ he leaned across her to look down into the crib – ‘or is our son really the most handsome baby I’ve ever laid eyes on?’
‘Yes to both,’ Grace answered.
Sam lay back again. ‘Do you think Cathy’s going to get over this?’
‘I don’t know.’ Grace’s eyes were sombre. ‘A lot of scars, Sam, for a twenty-year-old.’
‘Lot of scars for anyone,’ Sam said.
Chapter Forty-two
Cathy was in bed in her room. Lying awake in the dark.
Thinking about Kez. About the Chinese characters tattooed on the sole of her right foot, which she had since learned were the symbol for hyena, which Kez had told her, in the last hour of her life, that she admired.
That was what she had been doing, admiring hyenas, when Saul had committed the crime of happening upon her at the zoo and Kez, in all her madness, had believed he was mocking her. Had that been the foot, Cathy wondered, as she had many agonizing times before, with which Kez had stamped on Saul’s throat?
Just one of the questions, one of the thoughts about Kez, some sweet, most acutely painful, that roamed endlessly around Cathy’s mind most of the time these days and sleepless nights. And she had tried going back to Trent, ten days after Joshua’s birth, and it had been good seeing Coach Delaney – he was shocked, the way everyone was, but his sorrow over Kez’s death had seemed genuine – but so far as work was concerned, Cathy had been unable to settle at all.
Today had been a better day, almost a good one. Sam and Grace had spoken to her about her visit to Lucia, had been cool about it, had let her know they knew; that if she wanted to talk some more about it they would be there for her, and if she didn’t want to, that was all right with them, too.
She had not wanted to talk about it, had done – was doing – more than enough thinking. About whether she was sorry that the tubes and monitors had made it impossible to do what she thought she might otherwise have been tempted to do. About whether or not she might, perhaps, have found some kind of monstrous relief in shoving those flowers down Lucia’s throat.
Sick thoughts, burdensome thoughts. Not to be shared.
‘I think I pretty much closed that book,’ she had told them, and they had seemed to take her word for it.
Joshua was one lucky kid.
She had gone this morning to see Saul, and had felt a little better about him, too.
Done some thinking, he had typed on his computer, about the doctor thing.
‘What about it?’ she’d asked.
‘Never was all that sure,’ he’d typed, ‘I’d be any good.’
Cathy hadn’t said anything, was afraid of saying the wrong thing. It was something they had all veered away from, being uncertain if Saul was going to be fit enough to return to that long, hard learning road.
Think I might change courses, he typed on. Study furniture design.
Cathy had been surprised, but Saul had persisted with the theme and had looked about as close to animated as he had since Terri’s death, until he had grown too tired to go on typing and had lain back, the sadness back in his eyes again.
She supposed he was pretending about the doctor v furniture thing, perhaps for her sake because he knew how badly she felt. But Cathy knew a thing or two about faking recovery, about that particular brand of pretense, and sometimes, she knew too, you could almost kid yourself into feeling better.
Almost.
For her, the thing that still helped the most was running.
‘You run,’ Kez had told her, first time they’d met, ‘like you’re trying to escape.’
Which was fine, she had added, so long as Cathy was ‘in charge’.
Not in charge now, that was for sure.
She still went running though, as she always had.
But these days wherever she ran, on a track, in Haulover Park or on the beach, in her mind she was always back in Naples, running shoulder to shoulder with Kez.
››› If you’ve enjoyed this book and would like to discover more great vintage crime and thriller titles, as well as the most exciting crime and thriller authors writing today, visit: ›››
The Murder Room
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By Hilary Norman
(titles that appear in bold are published by The Murder Room)
Sam Becket Mysteries
Mind Games (1999)
Last Run (2007)
Shimmer (2009)
Caged (2010)
Hell (2011)
Eclipse (2012)
Standalone Novels
In Love and Friendship (1986)
Chateau Ella (1988)
Shattered Stars (1991)
Fascination (1992)
Spellbound (1993)
Laura (1994)
If I Should Die (1995) (originally published under the pen name Alexandra Henry)
The Key to Susanna (1996)
Susanna (1996)
The Pact (1997)
Too Close (1998)
Blind Fear (2000)
Deadly Games (2001)
Twisted Minds (2002)
No Escape (2003)
Guilt (2004)
Compulsion (2005)
Ralph’s Children (2008)
Hilary Norman
Hilary Norman was born and educated in London. After working as an actress she had careers in the fashion and broadcasting industries. She travelled extensively throughout Europe and lived for a time in the United States before writing her first international b
estseller, In Love and Friendship, which has been translated into a dozen languages. Her subsequent novels have been equally successful. She lives in North London, where she has spent most of her life, with her husband and their beloved RSPCA rescue dog
An Orion ebook
Copyright © Hilary Norman 2007
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This ebook first published in Great Britain in 2013
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 1 4719 0843 9
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